Avant-garde to New Wave: Czechoslovak Cinema, Surrealism and the Sixties (Berghahn on Film)

The cultural liberalization of communist Czechoslovakia in the 1960s produced many artistic accomplishments, not least the celebrated films of the Czech New Wave. This movement saw filmmakers use their new freedom to engage with traditions of the avant-garde, especially Surrealism. This book explores the avant-garde's influence over the New Wave and considers the political implications of that influence. The close analysis of selected films, ranging from the Oscar-winning __Closely Observed Trains__ to the aesthetically challenging __Daisies__, is contextualized by an account of the Czech avant-garde and a discussion of the films' immediate cultural and political background. Contents List of Illustrations Acknowledgements Introduction: Surrealism In and Out of the Czechoslovak New Wave 1. Inspirations, Opportunities: Cultural and Historical Contexts 2. Pavel Juráček’s Josef Kilián (1963) and A Case for the Young Hangman (1969): From the Surreal Object to the Absurd Signifier 3. Jiří Menzel’s Closely Observed Trains (1966): Hrabal and the Heterogeneous 4. Spoiled Aesthetics: Realism and Anti-Humanism in Věra Chytilová’s Daisies (1966) 5. Flights From History: Otherness, Politics and Folk Avant-Gardism in Juraj Jakubisko’s The Deserter and the Nomads (1968) and Birds, Orphans and Fools (1969) 6. Back to Utopia: Returns of the Repressed in Jaromil Jireš’s Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (1970) 7. Jan Švankmajer: Contemporary Czech Surrealism and the Renewal of Language Conclusion Bibliography Index